Nostalgia
by NutellaHeaven
Summary: Shin and Toma have been my childhood friends for as long as I could remember. We shared so many memories together, whether bright or melancholy. We were the best of friends. But as we got older, our innocent friendship began to flourish into a complicated romance . . .


**Author's Note: Hiya! Since Amnesia is my favorite anime, I wanted to write a multi-chapter story about our dear Heroine and her childhood/past memories with Shin and Toma. I find their relationship so adorable! I'll be combining features that are mentioned in the Heart/Diamond route of the games and anime (and adding my own perceptions as well), so I'm really excited to write about what Heroine, Shin, and Toma were like as children and adolescents! Also, I feel that it's important to note that I will be referring to the Heroine as "Aya", since I think that she should have a name (I tried to choose something simple but elegant at the same time). There's not going to be much romance in the early chapters since the featured characters will still be children, but I hope you guys like this introductory chapter! I'd love to hear what you guys think!**

* * *

Even though Mom and Dad never said it to my face, they always wondered why I didn't fit in with the other kids.

I didn't think that there was anything particularly wrong with me, and I didn't think either of my parents thought that I was necessarily a "problem child". I just didn't make friends easily. There was nothing unusual about that, right?

Of course, I normally attended daycare/school, and I left my house to go to places like the doctor's office, for obvious reasons. I also made regular trips to the local library. I usually went to the library weekly, unless the weather or family obligations prevented me. So it's not like I was some sort of antisocial recluse or anomaly.

But whenever Mom offered to take me to public shopping malls or parks, I usually declined. If I agreed to accompany her out of guilt or absolute desperation for entertainment, I plastered a smile on my face and said as little as possible. After all, if I didn't say anything, than there wouldn't be anything for people to perceive as rude. Mom always told me to be polite and appear presentable in public, so I wasn't doing anything wrong, was I?

Well, it varied by individual perception. Mom and Dad learned to tolerate it at times (Mom to a lesser degree), but some of our more talkative and nosy neighbors openly questioned my behavior.

Probably to Mom's chagrin, I much preferred to stay within the confines of my small room, curled up under my fluffy pink blanket with a book. The pastel pink walls of my room, the matching closet and carpeting, and even the bedroom dresser (which was a hideous shade of magenta, although Mom insisted that it was fuchsia) were familiar and comforting to me.

I liked books; fiction books in particular. Textbooks and encyclopedias didn't really have the same fantastical appeal as an original adventure saga or a dystopian novel. Still, I generally enjoyed reading more than socializing in crowded and noisy places. It seemed natural to me that loud places were simply annoying and an ear sore.

So on the day of September 7th, I was sitting in the back of my Dad's sleek Toshiba with my nose inside of another fairy-tale book. It was the first day of my second-grade year. In other words, the first day back from summer vacation. Most kids dreaded having to go back to school, but my thoughts usually weren't focused on school in the early hours of the day.

I happened to be reading "Hansel and Gretel" during the car ride that morning. It was the story of two poor siblings who were abandoned in the woods by their malicious mother. They stumbled across a house made of cookies and candy, but it was actually a trap set up by a witch who wanted to lure and eat the children. They eventually escaped after Gretel was able to outwit the witch and lock her inside of her oven. And when they returned home, their evil mother was mysteriously gone. It was an interesting tale. Some people theorized that the witch was their mother in disguise who was plotting to get rid of the children behind the back of their oblivious father.

_A house made of cookies and candy, huh?_ I sighed to myself as I leaned against the window.

_I want some sweets right now. I'm hungry . . . _

"Aya," Dad's deep baritone voice said, snapping me out of my thoughts. "We're here."

I glanced out the window, and I realized that Dad was right. I could easily spot the elegant, brick-covered school building where I had attended first-grade the previous year. I had gotten lost while immersing myself in a work of literature again.

Nonetheless, I closed my book gently, and I pushed on the side door handle.

"Have a good day at work, Dad," I called to him before closing the door behind me. I caught a glimpse of the rearview window, and I saw Dad's face stretch into a small smile. In his crisp, gray business suit, he always looked stern and uptight. I knew that he could be a kind and gentle man at heart, though.

I turned away from the parking lot and started to walk towards my school. It was six stories high, encompassing students from kindergarten through fifth grade, so the building towered over me. Almost intimidatingly so.

It was probably going to be an uneventful, average school day, but I still had to go.

I hastily adjusted my outfit, smoothing out the creases in my vest and dress shirt and straightening the folds in my skirt. I quickly ran my fingers through my plain brunette hair, too.

Then I walked through the entrance of the school.

* * *

During the first half of the day, there weren't any surprises. The day proceeded in a typical fashion. We met our teacher, we played light-hearted games to get to know our classmates, and we were assigned our own cubbies.

My classmates weren't too bad. The girls generally seemed bubbly, and the boys were all polite enough. But of course, they had already started to gather in groups of friends, primarily composed of people that they had befriended in previous years. While I got along with my past classmates perfectly fine, I was not especially close to any of them. Therefore, I did not properly fit into any cluster of friends.

I still played the bonding and getting-to-know-you games. We played "I've never done that before", where we had to hold up both of our hands and take turns (like the name of the game implied) coming up with actions that we've never done before. If you've done something that another player says that they haven't, you had to put a finger down. You were "out" if all of your fingers were lowered. It sounded like a fun concept, except that people started saying things like "I've never been a girl" or "I've never been named *insert name of classmate here*". I did get a few giggles when I saw someone lower their thumb when another person said, "I've never eaten dog food".

Afterwards, I stored my petite purse and my favorite black beret in my cubby. I didn't carry any other personal belongings with me, except for a book that I usually brought from home or checked out from the library.

I kept my book with me at all times of the school day, though.

And that included recess.

Naturally, when my teacher perkily announced that it was time for recess, I carried my storybook outside with me. The other kids made a beeline for the school playground, which was full of colorful slides, monkey bars, seesaws, and other entertaining equipment. Instead, I made a beeline for the closest oak tree. It was a fairly large tree that offered a decent amount of shade from the bright sunlight. I plopped myself onto the soft moss that had accumulated at the base of the rotting trunk.

I opened my book and flipped to the page that was marked by a small, red ribbon. I had placed it inside to serve as a bookmark.

I was going to peruse "Hansel and Gretel" again. I had already read the story at least twenty times, but that didn't matter to me. I liked the story. In fact, I liked lots of fairytales. There were the well-known fairytales, like "Cinderella" and "Jack and the Bean Stalk", and then there were the lesser known fairytales like "Clever Elsie" and "The Snow Queen". All of them were interesting tales that preached a variety of morals, or piqued my interest with their imaginative plot lines and features.

I smiled as I scoured the pages of my book. I couldn't tear my eyes away from the tiny and neat rows of font.

At least, not until I heard footsteps approaching, which was followed by someone's masculine-sounding voice.

"Hi." I glanced up from my book, half-expecting to see a teacher. However, my green eyes met a pair of sharp gold eyes that belonged to a young boy. He appeared to be around my age, but I only had height to base my assumption off of. He had blonde hair and he was dressed in a light-colored T-shirt and shorts. He was wearing some kind of black footwear, but it was hard to see his shoes clearly under the shade of the oak tree.

I could also make out a dark-haired boy standing behind him. This boy was slightly shorter in comparison, but he also appeared to be around my age. Despite the humid air, he looked perfectly comfortable in a black hoodie, jeans, and red sneakers. His piercing red eyes were focused on me, and it made me feel a little uneasy. He was also frowning.

"Um, hello," I responded. I assumed that the blonde boy was the one who addressed me, mainly because he was standing the closest to me. My assumption was confirmed when the aforementioned boy smiled at me.

"What are you doin'?" he asked.

I pursed my lips. "Reading a story."

"What story is it?"

"It's Hansel and Gretel."

"Oh, I see." The blonde boy nodded. "That's cool! My mom used to read that story to me all the time."

A slightly awkward silence ensued as the boy waited expectantly for a response from me. His dark-haired companion was certainly not helping to alleviate the tension, since he continued to stare daggers at me silently.

" . . . Do you want something?" I finally replied to the boy, causing him to take a step closer.

"Do you wanna play with us?" he blurted out, while pointing at the boy behind him.

I blinked in astonishment. I didn't even know these boys' names, and I was pretty sure that they didn't know mine. We were total strangers. What in the world would compel one of them to ask me to play with them? I was baffled. Even kids that I knew never asked me to play with them willingly. During the few times that other children _did_ invite me to play, it only happened due to pressure from their parents or another outside force.

"Toma," the other boy spoke. "You're bothering her. Look at her face."

"Oh, I'm sorry." The boy who had made the invitation to me, who was apparently named Toma, had a worried expression on his face. "You don't have to play with us if you don't want to. It's completely your choice!"

" . . . Why do you want me to play with you?" I inquired. "I don't know you . . . Or your friend." The boy dressed in black raised an eyebrow upon being called "Toma's friend", but he didn't object. I couldn't say that he looked thrilled or ecstatic, though.

"You looked sort of lonely over here by yourself," Toma explained. "I'm Toma, and that's Shin over there. We thought that maybe you'd like to join-"

"Personally, I don't care what she does," Shin muttered. "It doesn't make a difference to me."

I winced at the bluntness of his statement.

"Come on, Shin," Toma said. "You don't have to be so mean like that."

"I'm not being mean. I meant that she can do whatever she wants," Shin retorted. "I'm not begging or forcing her to play with us."

"Well, still. She may not like your tone."

"If someone doesn't like the way I speak, that's their problem."

Toma sighed, and then he leaned towards my right ear so that his whisper was audible to me. "Don't mind Shin. He's actually a nice guy once you get to know him."

"Ah." I restrained myself from giggling or making a snarky comment. My first impression of him was pretty much the opposite of "nice".

"So are you just going to sit there, or are you going to make a decision?" Shin huffed impatiently.

"Don't feel pressured to say yes," Toma chimed in.

To be honest, these boys didn't seem horribly unpleasant. Well, maybe Shin seemed a little curt, but I definitely didn't hate either of these boys. I was certainly surprised that they had even bothered to approach me in the first place.

But that didn't change the fact that I had only just learned their names, and that I knew very little about them other than the names they went by.

So I shook my head. "I'd rather stay here."

"Oh, okay." For a split second, Toma looked slightly disappointed, but he quickly recovered and grinned at me. "Maybe you can join us another time. Right Shin?"

"Sure, whatever floats your boat." Shin shrugged as Toma chuckled and playfully smacked him on the back. Shin scowled at the gesture.

"Hey," Toma's gaze was still fixed upon me. "Can you tell me your name?"

"Why do you need to know my name?"

"I want to know." Toma paused. "Actually, since you, Shin, and I go to this school, I thought that we should at least know your name."

Out of the corner of my peripheral vision, I can see Shin staring at me again. Was he actually somewhat interested? Toma is staring intensely at me, too. I hesitated for a few seconds, but I didn't need to give my reply an incredible amount of consideration.

_Oh, well. It's just my name. It's not as if I'm selling my soul to Satan._

"You can call me Aya."


End file.
